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The risk of overheating in healthcare buildings

We currently don't know to what extent there is a problem with overheating in buildings housing vulnerable people in Scotland. However, there is anecdotal evidence of overheating being an issue in some NHS facilities and in care homes.

This scoping study will establish how extensive existing internal temperature data are and how they could be accessed and applied to our future main research project, see specification. The main project will look at how to identify current and future risk of overheating and possible meassures to reduce the risk.

These risks from rising temperatures include both the direct risk to occupants in terms of their comfort and safety and the indirect safety risks from building systems like failure of electrical wiring or rising cold water temperature, and the spread of diseases like legionella.

Overheating is of particular concern in buildings housing vulnerable people, who can be less adaptableto temperature extremes and less resilient to building system failures.